Is it too late?

At more than 50 years old, a series of events and encounters in my life have made me realised that I am very probably 'on the spectrum'. It has come to the point where I can no longer brush it under the carpet, act as a 'neurotypical' or let it continue to ruin my life.

I was 41 when I came to the realisation that I was autistic, prompted in part by realisation my son was. I was officially diagnosed a year ago. When I approached the GP I explained why I thought I was autistic and asked to be referred for assessment. He happily wrote the letter for me and I it took about a year to get my diagnosis. For me it felt important to have an official diagnosis but not everyone feels that way. If you are sure you have it then you might not need the diagnosis.

I've learned more about myself since learning about autism. I can recognise why I react in certain ways, I can identify behaviour prompted by the autism and know now that I need to avoid certain situations that stress me out. I even changed jobs because I recognized that my old one was causing me stress because it was striking up hard against my autism.